Shortcomings review: “Randall Park Dazzles In Directorial Debut”

Based on the graphic novel by Adrian Tomine and buoyed by the performances of Justin H. Min and comedian Sherry Cola, first-time director Randall Park delivers a solid romantic comedy that manages to make our protagonist wrestle with their toxic behavior in ways that would make 500 Days of Summer envious.

Shortcomings

Directed by Randall Park, Starring Justin H. Min, Ally Maki, and Sherry Cola

Runtime: 1 hour 32 mins

Synopsis

Aspiring director Ben (played by Justin H. Min) reaches a rough patch with his girlfriend of many years that is only worsened when she takes an interns hip in New York. During their time apart, Ben wrestles with a variety of racial issues within himself and his local community, such as the issue of exoticism, representation within Hollywood. Ben eventually identifies his biggest problem: his self-loathing and negative outlook on dating and interacting with the world.

Ben and Alice

Ben (Min) and Alice (played by Sherry Cola) are best friends who’s relationship allows the audience a chance to explore different Asian cultural and relational issues as Ben is dealing with his insecurities, lack of growth, and accountability compared to his girlfriend Miko (played by Ally Maki) who’s tired of dealing with his stagnation. Meanwhile, Alice is wrestling with their commitment issues and familial acceptance of their queerness, asking Ben to act as her fake boyfriend just to keep her family from inspecting her sexuality. The pairing works incredibly well as we get glimpses of Alice’s progress while Ben is falling apart spectacularly and both Min and Cola execute their scenes together incredibly well. Chemistry is a tough thing to fake: you either have it naturally or have worked to build it. With Min and Cola, you honestly feel like they’ve been friends for decades.

Min’s facial expressions and vocal frustrations could honestly be clipped out as a sizzle real to explain why this movie is so funny. There were many times he would hold back a comment or say something awkward, it felt like he was speaking for the audience in those moments. Sure, some of the frustrations Ben experiences are his own making, but the more bizarre ones thrust upon him by the Bay Area art scene definitely spoke for everyone in my screening. The comedic style reminded me a lot of how Vince Vaughn tackles comedic scenes, with a mixture of facial reactions to what he’s experiencing and lines that seemed aimed at the audience directly and not the character immediately in front of them; it works to great effect here.

Deftly Avoiding Cliches

Romcom clichés aren’t likely going away anytime soon, but indie romcoms films created since the mid-2000s have largely been critiques of the problems within the genre. Take 500 Days of Summer for example: sure, it may get maligned for reusing the manic pixie dream girl stereotype or people rooting for / sympathizing with Tom (Joseph Gordon Levitt), however it’s addressing the stereotypical problems with the medium: headstrong male protagonists who want the feeling of romance without really putting in the work. The best examples in this genre tend to use a stereotypical trope, but find ways to subvert it for modern audiences (especially millennials that likely grew up in the 1990s Disney animation period and have grown cold / disillusioned over those portrayals of love and romance).

Shortcomings may be coming out in 2023, but its sensibilities are firmly rooted in that critical atmosphere that Tomine was writing from. The story arc of two lovers having a falling out while one moves away is nothing new, but the graphic novel and its film counterpart aren’t aiming for a resolution that is necessarily satisfying. In keeping with its title, the film is focused on showing us where our characters are failing, where they can grow, but without giving us a wink and nod to make us feel better. If there’s potentially one failing in 500 Days that Shortcomings succeeds in, it’s this understanding. Tom’s character gets a nice camera nod that he’s going to be alright as we see the seasons shift to Autumn (signified by a potential new woman in his life) but indicates that his growth, whatever amount there is, is still going to take time.

Compare that to Ben, who by the end of the film, only showcases a resolution in progress. We know he’s learned a valuable lesson about himself and relationships going forward, but we don’t know if and/or when he’ll have a happy ending. In this way, the film doesn’t let the arc or necessity for his growth off the hook and doesn’t cheapen the finale with a last minute nod to the audience (e.g. like the Autumn scene).

Modern Representation Issues

There’s a moment in Black AF, a series created and starred in by Kenya Barris (creator of Black-ish and it’s spin-offs), where he’s struggling to lend his support behind a new black-directed film that he doesn’t care for. This leads to a series of conversations with Tyler Perry and other successful black creatives about his feelings and place in Hollywood, white vs black critical lenses, what does solidarity mean and look like, and what place does mediocrity have in a creative space when you haven’t had access to the space for a long time.

As a reviewer and writer, I have wrestled with these ideas for a long time and my views have constantly changed over time. When you learn about movies in a largely white space, you don’t realize that what you consider quality acting, cinematography norms, and what you’ve elevated for years (to name a few aspects) may be problematic when it doesn’t consider other cultural perspectives. Additionally, even if the general consensus for a non-white film is that it ultimately wasn’t good, that doesn’t mean that film’s existence is unwarranted when there’s just as many mediocre or worse films made by white directors.

Shortcomings kicks off that conversation by starting the movie with a “stereotypical rich person buys the building to spite the person that scorned them” trope (we really have to come up with a better name for that), headlined by Ronny Chieng and Stephanie Hsu who are pitch perfect castings due to the wave of new cinema representation (Chieng has been getting more roles like in M3GAN or Hsu’s Oscar-nominated role in Everything Everywhere All At Once and this year’s Joy Ride).

In this way, the original graphic novel was almost prophetic regarding the way different minority creatives could and would feel about more representation that comes about through blockbuster success. If our critical lenses have only been shaped by white movie theory, than it stands to reason that much like Ben, we might role our eyes at new movies with minority characters simply retreading the same tropes over and over with nothing new to say or innovate on besides: “Hey, we’re diverse”. The conclusion reached by the movie is a sound one, and while it’s certainly an issue I continue to grapple with regularly, I can respect the place the movie goes to with this thread. I won’t spoil it for you here, but suffice it to say, I think it’s a solid closure thematically.

Park’s Directing

For his first time in the chair, Park did a fantastic job, and even throws a cameo of himself near the middle of the film as a waiter. There’s a few great moments peppered throughout, like the awkward movie ticket booth scene where Gene (Spiderman’s Jacob Batalon) overhears how Ben and Autumn (played by Tavi Gevinson, no relation to 500 Days) couldn’t be intimate the night before and plays on our understanding of how ticket booth microphones work. Look, I know that likely sounds very odd, but it will make complete sense when you see it.

There’s another scene between Ben and Miko where they are separated by a wall/doorway, and since they likely shot this on location, Park has to have the camera on both sides to catch their reaction. On a soundstage, they would probably be able to shoot around the wall and catch their reactions together ratehr than splicing the takes together, but the desired effect of separation is still achieved.

The first time Ben sees Autumn’s band at a show, there’s a great red hue covering her face on stage that makes the proceedings seem more epic…that is until they start playing and we realize that Autumn is stranger than we initially thought. Park has a great eye that’s going to serve him well on future projects.

When it comes to jokes and conversations within the movie, Ben and Alice work well as previously stated, but it doesn’t work well with everyone else all the time. For example, the pacing of some conversations run a tad long, which isn’t a deal breaker given the short runtime…but it does mean some conversations in the movie seem to run past their natural stopping point. Additionally some jokes also suffered from this issue, where it seemed like the comedic value had already been maximized and nothing new was happening by repeating the same joke. Some audiences members may be fine by the absurdity in these moments, but each time it happened I was turned off by a certain point and realize some may also get exhausted – though the movie as a whole does do enough to keep you engaged after those moments end.

Conclusion / Recommendation

With very few moments of disconnect or wasted scenes, Shortcomings delivers a solid, indie comedy that challenges and presents complicated narratives on Asian-American race relations: how they deal with and engage with whiteness, exoticism, and representation and gives the audience a moment to dwell on that and recognize that complexity.

If you love quirky indie comedies with fresh commentaries on relationships and how we engage with and digest media, you’ll love it. If you can take a few friends along, the laughs will be many and you won’t regret it. I would also recommend checking your local cinema instead of waiting for home release as this is a smaller production that could use the support.

Score: 8 out of 10